An Eighty Percent Solution (CorpGov) (43 page)

“Well, if we decide to go through with it
,
we can limit the damage by isolating the person making contact
.
Take one of the new recruits and limit their knowledge of our organization even further.”

“Agreed
,
but then
we’d
limit our ability to have a dialogue.”

“Not necessarily
,”
Linc offered from his professional knowledge
.
“
Have that
someone
, a cutout, physically
tie two phones together receiver to transmitter
.
The person would only be needed to dial the number and put the phones together
.
Additionally
,
we could also use multiple
cutouts before the call goes through
.
It’s such an old dodge I don’t think anyone would think of it.”

“Yes
,
and
I’m certain Augustine could monitor a trace
.
Even if successful, the manual
percomm
links
would deny anything but a signal to process for comparison on other lines
.”

Now Sonya took her time thinking.
“Any other risks?”

“We could put everyone on watch duty to make sure if someone does show up we have time to escape,” Jonah offered
.

“Well, then I call for a vote,” Sonya said
.
“All opposed
?”
No hands showed
.
“I guess just as a formality…
a
ll in favor
?”
Everyone thrust up their hand.

“Carried
.
The call time is set for
tonight.”

“Tonight?”

“Better sooner than later
.
Set it up
.
Jonah, you set up security
.
Linc you handle the cutouts
.
Tony will be our voice.”

* * *
 

At one time in her early youth
,
Sonya
learned to
isolate a single nerve in her body and heighten or dead
en its input, a survival trait
.
She sat in a lotus, nude
,
in the center of her meditation room with her eyes rolled up in her head
.
She searched inside her body for groups of nerves to deaden
to attenuate the pain
.
H
er head throbbed in a way she couldn’t seem to control
.

One by one
she turned off the nerve endings
until she couldn’t feel anything of the outside world
,
but the pain remained
.
M
any years ago
her mother
had
taught her
how
to encapsulate illnesses and since
then
she’d never been sick, but she remembered some
of those feelings
—
the loss of control, the pain and the lack of
well
-
being, just like her body’s responses now
.

She turned her sight inward
.
For a brief moment she just relaxed and rode on the flow of her bloodstream
,
trying to adjust her
senses to her new
state
.
The pulsing motion, timed with each pump of her heart, started to make her nauseous
.
She contemptuously turned off those neural inputs, an oversight
and lack of focus
.

It took several
more
second
s before she got her bearings and realized she now navigated through
her kidneys
.
Ev
erything looked in exceptional health
.
She flowed along out of the kidney
.
Ahead she sensed
a foulness
.
As she floated further down
,
the blood pathway became clouded with necrotic cells, obscuring her vision
.
As she rolled into the liver, lesions
spotted across its width
, with entire branches clogged
in
an
all
-
out war between her body’s immune system and the
cause of the
damage
.

Breaking
her consciousness from the easy flow of the bloodstream she fought through tissue to worm deeper into the liver
.
She stopped next
in
one of the more virulent patches
, visibly expanding
before her
.
Healthy tissue and body defenses fought a losing battle as the invaders
left naught but the dead and dying
in their wake
.
She’d never seen anything move so quickly
.

Sonya encapsulated the infectious patch in a gossamer bag, allowing new defenders to rush to the defense
.
In the past this gave her body the ability to not only defeat the disease but to learn from it and become protected for the next time, just as a body is supposed to learn
.
But this time she watched the new defenders die just as fast and her isolation expand like a balloon continuing to be inflated
.
The rate of expansion slowed to a crawl compared to its previous rampage, but it continued
.
Sonya put more of her personal strength into the enclosure
.
Still it expanded
.
She poured even more power into it
.
Still it expanded.

For the first time in many, many years, fear touched Sonya’s mind.

Adjust Plan

Over the next hour, at a cost of hundreds of thousands of civilians, a single pony nuke or cyphod chemical bomb
could’ve
destroyed up
to
ninety-five percent
of the GAM membership
.
They lounged inconspicuously in doorways
,
drank coffee in terrace bistros
,
drove lift-trucks in racetracks around city blocks
,
and even
patrolled the street level
.
Not one felt comfortable in their role a
s
lookout
.
Every one of them nursed second thought
s
and fears about this mission
.
Each one put every other thought and effort into watching for the precursors of a trap
.
Reports from them all came into Augustine’s neural net
, every one of them
comfortably
negative
.

“All clear, Tony
.
Make the call.”

Pushing one single button engaged the complex network of blind
percomm
connections and duplicitous network jockeying
.
In an age of crystal clear audio connections, this one scratched and crackled with odd noises
.

“It’s your nickel,” Tony said
.
While the elaborate system synthesized his voice
,
no
on
e had any illusion that it couldn’t be broken
.
They all agreed Tony should act as the GAM voice in this meeting
.
Only Tony and Augustine sat in presence even with all the precautions they had taken
.

“What
the hell’
s a nickel?”
wondered the voice on the other end of the line.

“A historical unit of currency
.
Ancient
slang for ‘you initiated the call
,
so get on with it.’”
Tony looked at Augustine
,
who shook her head
.
N
o tracing attempts hit the line or any intermediate connection.

“True
.
Thank you for your contact
.
I know the risk you are taking
.
My people have assured me that you are not tracing the line and I’m sure you have done the same.”

“So we have the minimum amount of trust
.
Trace or no, we won’t stay on line long
.
Spill it.”

“Very well
.
I propose that you call off your attacks on
Nanogate
and its affiliates.”

“Getting that close to shutting your doors?” Tony immediately regretted the jibe
.
It might limit his opponent’s candor
.

“Frankly, yes
.
Call me a survivor if you wish
,
but I’d like to go on surviving
.”
Everyone listening, in person and remotely
,
took a brief pause at the admission.

“Well, we aren’t going to just stop
.
Nanogate
is a legitimate target in our eyes
.
What are you offering in return
?
”

“A new target.”

“We’ve got hundreds of juicy targets.”

“Not with inside information, you don’t, no matter how good a wire jock you have.”

“What specifically are you offering?”

“I will provide you detailed information that will allow you to take this attack to one of the other major conglomerates
.
This information will include areas of sensitivity, detailed intelligence
,
and aid in obtaining even more information to make your attacks safer and more pointed
.”

Tony’s mouth gaped
.
“How do we know
you aren’t setting us up?”
he
counterpunched
weakly.

“You don’t
.
What assurances will you give me that you won’t attack both firms under my care and these others?”

“You have a valid point
.
If we agree,
what’s
the next step you propose?”

“I propose three future meetings that will provide you with the information I’ve promised
.
Each time I will provide more sensitive information
,
assuming I see the aggression against my companies cease.”

“Agreed,” Tony said, not even looking to his compatriots.

“We need a secure method of communication for these three meetings
.”

Without prompting,
Augustine scribbled a notation on a piece of paper and handed it to Tony
, who read and processed the information swiftly.
“We
’
ll each send the other a two
-
gig encryption key for each meeting
.
By using both keys in alternation
,
we can limit the attack to brute force only
.
The keys are to be hand generated
.
No computer
—
not even an isolated system
—
is to be involved
.
Send your three keys to General Delivery in Tucson, Arizona
,
in care of Jefferson Thomas.”

“Agreed
.
You send your key to William Wenner, 1456 South Oscar R
oad
, Beach City, Oregon.”

“Our next call will be exactly four days from now at this same time
.
We will refrain from any attacks during that period.”

“Thank you.”

“I won’t say ‘You’re welcome.’”

“I wouldn’t expect it.”

* * *
 

Not for the first time
,
Mr. Marks dressed in something other than his yellow tights
.
This time he wore
professional
overalls bearing the logo of Volt Electrical
.
Marks hummed off key as the
Taste Dynamics
security guard examined the work order Marks
had
fabricated just ten minutes before
.